Tangle
by EmmaMary
Summary: They wait in silence as they sink into one another, trying to drown themselves in their griefstricken, heartsick, euphoria. RHr, preDH!


Disclaimer- I own nothing.

* * *

They sit hidden from sight on top of a grassy hill sprinkled with thick, tall trees. The mud is soft and bouncy beneath the soles of their trainers, contrasting completely with the strife playing out far below them.

The sky is covered in a milky blackness that had formed from the combination of thick smoke from blazing fires, and the more daunting dementors floating in foretaste, ready for attack.

The darkness of the sky is mirroring nothing but the world.

Hermione's back presses up against the base of a rather wide tree and a flock of birds scatter wide into the dark sky at the predatory movement of something that cannot be seen by either of the two harbored souls. They turn swiftly when they hear the noise, trying to get a glimpse of the raptor that had made the sound. The harsh bark of the tree scrapes cruelly against Hermione's forearm, it has drawn blood and she knows it, but she doesn't care. The small cuts now slowly dripping blood are too trivial for her now. A small fox runs from the source of the sound, carrying a small animal happily in his mouth. Hermione looks away quickly; too much death has already been captured in her eyes.

They wait in silence for the signal of red smoke. The signal that will tell them it is time to join the others, time to fight, time to be ready to die.

She blocks out the harrowing screams that float dauntingly up the hill when they reach her ears. In her own justified silence she now notices a hand grasped tightly around her own, how long it has been there she does not know, but the warmth it brings shatters the inescapable terror and lets a slight beam of light in. In the days prior to the one she is living now this hand has done the same thing, so often has it been attached to her own she now sees the clasping of it to unite a single limb trapped between two tattered beaus.

She tugs his hand and he moves closer to her, so close that she must bend her head back so far to look into his eyes the top of her head touches the tree. Her thick curls inevitably getting tangled with the rough bark that slashed her just moment before.

She wishes that he would wrap one arm around her waist and pull her close, holding onto her with ferocious passion, but he cannot. Their wands must be out and ready at all moments, this is a war after all, and their hands seemed to be glued together so tightly she wouldn't dream of making him let go.

So she settles for this, looking up into the face that has brought her so much solace throughout the last year. Her gaze drifts from the freckles dashed lightly across the bridge of his nose to his soft lips, chapped from the harsh wind. She wishes those lips would open up to reveal a smile, one of his long and full real smiles that have been so lacking from both their lives lately. She finds his windswept hair falling carelessly over his forehead, dancing over his eyes. She lets herself indulge only for a moment in the fantasy that one day she will hold her child lovingly in her arms and the baby will have a thick mane of ginger hair.

Hermione tries to soak up this face. She pulls in every last detail and makes her brain become somewhat of a sponge so that she can remember more than anyone thinks a brain can. She wants a detailed photograph to store in her mind forever; she wants to bury it to the depths of her soul and keep it there, safe and hidden. So she grasps each detail of him, every single emotions she reads on his face, off his body. She clasps every last pore and stacks them neatly on the shelves of her mind, filling them to the ceiling. Yet when there is a rustle of a bird a few feet away she turns to look out of instinct and it as if someone is running through her mind knocking over every last shelf that stores her memories of him, like they had done years ago in the department of mysteries. Each image and feeling crashes to the floor and shatters, and in the split second her eyes have drifted from his face, she has already forgotten him.

She looks back sadly and frantically tries to rememorize his solemn face. She hasn't got much time and she must learn to remember him, she cannot risk his memory swirling out of her mind if he is lost like the smoke that is floating into the already blackened sky.

Her gaze finds the thing she loves most about him, his own eyes, staring at her intently.

Their eyes clash in color and idea but mirror one another in affection. They do not speak, all the words that have needed to be said have been spoken long ago. The truth falls around them like waterfalls and raindrops but they do not feel the mist and therefore remains dry. Their eyes tell each other nothing, but act out of selfishness. They sink into one another trying to drown themselves in their grief-stricken, heartsick, euphoria. Easily they succeed as though this is the only feeling either one has ever felt. In this moment they do not become one, but realize they have always been a single entity. Their true spirits mirror each other in destiny and a single moira that is beyond all that is happening around them. A sob congregates in the pit of Hermione's stomach and if she hadn't become so good at keeping them down she surely would have leaked a shower of tears.

She is sure she didn't make a sound or movement to portray this shift in feeling, but the one spirit that links them together knows what has happened and Ron pulls her jus a little bit closer.

He sinks his head down to meet hers and rests his forehead to hers, touching his crooked nose to the one that resembles a button lying on her face. Eskimo kisses calm her and he delivers them as though he is a five year old child, cute and naïve of what they mean to her.

He closes his eyes, not worrying about the danger that could follow this action, and sighs, the most sound either of them has made in a lifetime, and she cannot help but follow suit.

She bends her body so her tummy is touching his, her back curing inward so there faces still touch. He lets go of her hand, and a ripple of loss runs through her veins, but he has only done it to sustain her balance by placing it on her back, and once he does her blood runs smoothly again. She runs her delicate hand up his arm and curves in around his neck.

They stay like this and listen to their hearts beat as one.

She never wants this love to leave her hopeless, but as a puff of red disperses into the sky that has, till now, only held shades of black, she knows it already has.


End file.
